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Bonnie Hunt Biography

Posted by Vogt
at May 9, 2008

Bonnie Hunt.jpg

Described by Entertainment Weekly as “the hands-down best (talk show) guest in America,” Chicago-born Bonnie Hunt began pursuing her acting career while working as a nurse at that city’s Northwestern University Hospital. (Reportedly as late as the early 1990s, she returned to that profession for a month or so each year.) The smart, pixie-like writer-performer co-founded the Chicago improvisational troupe An Impulsive Thing before joining the famed Second City improv group, appearing in their productions “Bright Lights, Night Baseball,” “Jean Paul Sartre and Ringo” and “How Green Were My Values.” After making her feature debut as the waitress who spills toothpicks before a calculating Dustin Hoffman in Barry Levinson’s Oscar-winning Best Picture “Rain Man” (1988), she moved to Los Angeles with a short-lived West Coast offshoot of Second City and turned down three offers from “Saturday Night Live” while working to get her own show on the air.

Hunt’s first leading role cast her as second fiddle to both Charles Grodin and the galumphing Saint Bernard “Beethoven” (1992), with whom she reunited for “Beethoven’s 2nd” (1993). She also had a memorable 30-second cameo as a fanatical tour guide in “Dave” (also 1993) but had less luck as Marisa Tomei’s best pal in the uneven “Only You” (1994), despite savoring the three-month shoot in Italy. Though critics were indifferent to her portrayal of Robin Williams’ love interest in “Jumanji” (1995), her years at Second City had prepared her well for the Williams whirlwind, and the film earned over $100 million at the box office. No such fate awaited the reception of “Getting Away With Murder” (1996), an embarrassment for Jack Lemmon, Lily Tomlin and Dan Aykroyd, from which Hunt emerged relatively unscathed as Aykroyd’s cast off girlfriend. After a small role in the coming-of-age drama “Now and Then” (1995), she impressed reviewers as the bitter older sister of Renee Zellweger in Cameron Crowe’s romantic/sports comedy “Jerry Maguire” (1996).

As for TV, she made her debut as a regular on the short-lived, soap-like sitcom “Grand” (CBS, 1990), followed by a stint on the elementary school sitcom “Davis Rules” (ABC, 1991; CBS, 1992), co-starring with Randy Quaid and Jonathan Winters and displaying her considerable comic talents, which included holding her own opposite the exuberant Winters. Her friendship with talk show host David Letterman led to her becoming the first woman to create, write, co-executive produce (with Letterman) and star in her own short-lived series, “The Building” (CBS, 1993). The ensemble comedy featuring Hunt’s Second City colleagues attempted to recreate the feel of an improvisational troupe with its rich characterizations and overlapping dialogue. Again with Letterman’s backing, she created and produced the “The Bonnie Hunt Show/Bonnie” (CBS, 1995-1996), on which she played a Chicago TV station reporter. Taped in real time without retakes, each episode combined scripted and improvisational material, including a “man-in-the-street” report by Hunt, but in spite of sterling reviews and a small but loyal following, the show died after one season.

Though there were no more stabs at series TV, Hunt remained busy with a starring turn as a woman trapped overnight in a locked subway exit in the “Fern’s Heart of Darkness” segment of HBO’s “Subway Stories: Tales From the Underground” (1997) and small roles in “Kissing a Fool” (1998) and Sydney Pollack’s anachronistic “Random Hearts” (1999), in which she played an old friend of Kristin Scott Thomas. She also voiced the character of Rosie the black widow spider in the delightful, animated adventure comedy “A Bug’s Life” (also 1998) and played Tom Hanks’ plain-speaking, ever-warm wife in “The Green Mile” (also 1999). Hunt signed to direct her first feature, “Convenience”, in 1997, but with it on hold, she made her directorial debut at the helm of “Return to Me” (2000), co-scripted by longtime collaborator Don Lake, a regular on both her TV series. Shot almost entirely in her hometown of Chicago, the romance starred David Duchovny as a man who falls in love with Minnie Driver, the recipient of his deceased wife’s transplanted heart.

In 2002, Hunt got the chance to become the hands-down best TV talk show host—fictionally, anyway—playing local Chicago morning show personality Bonnie Molloy, who finds it hard to separate her professional and personal lives in the ABC television sit-com “Life With Bonnie” (2002-2004). The show—with scripts that were largely improvised and benefited from guest spots by many of Hunt’s showbiz colleagues such as Duchovny—was not on the air long before Hunt took near-total control, removing many of the writers and handling many of the production details herself. With Hunt at the helm, the show was renewed for an even more successful second season as part of ABC’s “TGiF” lineup, and the actress received Golden Globe nominations for Best Performance by an Actress in a Television Series - Musical or Comedy in both 2003 and 2004. She also continued her successful career in film, teaming with Steve Martin as the parents of a dozen demanding kids in the mild but commercially successful remake of “Cheaper by the Dozen” (2003).

She next starred in a little known indie feature, “Loggerheads” (2005), a family drama about a mother (Hunt) who makes a last ditch effort to find the son (Kip Pardue) she was forced to give up for adoption as a teenager. Hunt then reprised her role as the overburdened mother in “Cheaper By the Dozen 2” (2005), costarring Steven Martin as the patriarch of a family of twelve. Meanwhile, she crossed over to animation, providing the voice of Sally in “Cars” (2006), the latest soon-to-be animated classic from Pixar Studios about a hotshot race car (Owen Wilson) stuck in a sleepy Route 66 town populated by an eccentric array of characters who help steer him right.

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Jennifer Coolidge Biography

Posted by Vogt
at May 9, 2008

Jennifer Coolidge.jpg

A voluptuous blonde actress who has made a career of playing bimbos despite her more experimental comedy background, Massachusetts native Jennifer Coolidge took her Emerson College degree to New York City and joined the Gotham City Improv group before heading to Los Angeles to become a member of the famed Groundlings. Discovered in the early 1990s, she was cast in her first television series guest role on NBC’s “Seinfeld”, playing a masseuse who won’t offer her professional services to boyfriend Jerry in a 1993 episode. The following year she was a featured regular on the short-lived sketch series “She TV” on ABC. Another short-lived sketch comedy series, “Saturday Night Special” (Fox, 1995-96), featured Coolidge as writer and cast member, though this would-be “Saturday Night Live” (NBC) competitor that first aired in mid-April didn’t make it through May.

Having appeared on the Showtime-aired Roger Corman horror presentations “Not of This Earth” and “Bucket of Blood” in 1995, Coolidge made her big-screen debut in the inane courtroom comedy “Trial and Error”, co-starring “Seinfeld” alum Michael Richards. Equally believable as a pampered princess or a frumpy manicurist, Coolidge appeared in films more frequently with several character parts in 1998, including roles in the children’s comedy “Slappy and the Stinkers”, and a cameo as a sexy traffic cop in “A Night at the Roxbury”. She also continued television work, most notably in a recurring part on the animated series “King of the Hill” (Fox) from 1997-1999, and in the more adult comedy “Rude Awakening” (Showtime) in 1998.

Coolidge had her breakthrough role in the popular comedy “American Pie” (1999) playing a well-preserved, boozed-up mom who seduces her son’s classmate with the admission that she likes her scotch and men the same way: aged eighteen years. Recreating the character with a larger part in the 2001 sequel, “American Pie 2”, wasn’t the only time Coolidge played drunk and sultry. “Down to Earth”, the 2001 remake of “Heaven Can Wait”, co-starred the actress as the scheming wife of an elderly mogul, a gold-digging type she previously visited as a wealthy dog owner more enamored with the trainer than her husband in the improv-based comedy “Best in Show” (2000). As Betty, a mostly silent hairstylist in the warm “The Broken Hearts Club: A Romantic Comedy” (2000), Coolidge heard the confessions and life lessons of a group of gay friends; as the unlucky but good-natured manicurist Paulette in “Legally Blonde”, she was a confidante to Elle Woods (Reese Witherspoon), a walking Malibu Barbie-cum-Harvard Law student.

With roles that showcased the actress’ no-holds-barred approach to comedy and her vanity-free comfort with altering both her appearance and manner to be unappealing, Coolidge emerged as a valuable character player and gifted comedienne. Working steadily, she had a brief cameo in the fashion espionage spoof “Zoolander” (2001) and was featured in the police parody “Showtime” (2001) as well as co-starred in the Showtime-aired romantic comedy “Oooph!” (2001), which was set to debut in the 2001-2002 season. In 2003, Coolidge joined with former co-stars once again, as she briefly reprised her manicurist role in “Legally Blonde 2: Red, White and Blonde”, and made another cameo as Stifler’s mom in “American Wedding,” followed by a turn as Hilary Duff’s wicked stepmother in “A Cinderella Story” (2004).

Coolidge’s pneumatic form graced several TV comedies as well, with major guest appearances on “Frasier,” “Sex and the City”, and “According to Jim.” A 2003 stint on an episode of “Friends” brought her to the attention of the producers who, upon the show’s finale, departed for the Matt LeBlanc spin-off “Joey” (NBC, 2004 - ), where she was cast in a semi-regular role as dim but sweet actor Joey Tribbiani’s all-too-blunt Hollywood agent Bobbi. Coolidge was then underused in a brief role as a White-Faced Woman in the Jim Carrey vehicle, “Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events” (2004), an adaptation of the popular series of children’s books. She then was the voice of Aunt Fanny in “Robots” (2005), the well-reviewed animated feature about a world inhabited by mechanical beings.

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